


I Would Laugh if it Wasn't Me

by marcaskane (noblydonedonnanoble)



Category: Parks and Recreation
Genre: Alternate Universe - Improv Troupe, F/M
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2014-10-11
Updated: 2014-10-11
Packaged: 2018-02-20 19:48:13
Rating: General Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 903
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/2440745
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/noblydonedonnanoble/pseuds/marcaskane
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>After dancing around the subject for ages, Leslie decides to ask Ben out, but for some reason that she can't understand, he seems reluctant.</p><p> </p><p>Improv troupe AU in which the parks and rec department make up the Pawnee Players; Chris is their manager; April is the ticket taker; and Ron just owns the building, and runs the pub downstairs.</p>
            </blockquote>





	I Would Laugh if it Wasn't Me

**Author's Note:**

> This is actually written for a school assignment, but I've seriously fallen in love with this 'verse so there will most likely be more to it.

                Not that Leslie’s keeping track, but Ben is currently four minutes and thirty-six seconds later than normal. He always arrives at five fifteen on the dot, and she’d been hoping for a good opportunity to talk to him before the all-troupe meeting at five thirty.

                She spent nearly an hour the night before planning with Ann, trying to figure out the best time to ask Ben out. They’ve been skirting around the subject for months now, and although she feels confident that Ben’s equally interested, it’s hard to tell for sure because he hasn’t done anything about it.

                But tonight, she’s determined to wonder no more. If she asks Ben out and he says no… well, she’ll get over it.

                Hopefully he won’t say no.

                The second he finally walks in, he notices Leslie sitting on one of the sagging sofas and he gives her a huge smile, says, “Hey, Leslie,” as he walks across the room to the coat rack.

                And she grins right back. “Hi Ben. I, um…” When she trails off, Ben glances at her with eyebrows raised, but after mentally running through the conversation she’d prepared with Ann, she’s back on her feet. “Remember that idea you floated the other day for a comedy festival?”

                “Oh, yeah!” He temporarily swells with pride, but rather quickly, he seems to deflate again. He slumps down beside Leslie, slouching tragically in his seat. “When Chris and I talked earlier today, though, he said that Ron probably wouldn’t be too eager to go along with it.”

                Leslie smiles knowingly. As soon as Ben first brought it up, the thought had occurred to her that Ron would object; he likes the added business that the Pawnee Players bring in for his pub, but he certainly wouldn’t like to handle the crowds that even a small-scale festival would draw in.

                But she’s got several ideas for how to possibly convince Ron to agree, and she says as much to Ben. “I actually came up with a few ideas to get Ron on board, and I was thinking maybe we could do some brainstorming tonight after the show.”

                “That… that would be great.” Ben’s eyes have lit up and Leslie is thrilled that she’s made him so happy. “I suppose we can hang back here once we’re all done?”

                What? No, that’s not what she means at all. “Or we could… get a drink, a bite to eat? Talk about it then.”

                Immediately, he freezes. He’s still smiling, but there’s something fake to it now, and Leslie doesn’t miss that he scoots farther away from her on the sofa, as though only just now realizing how close they’d been sitting. “Oh, right. I, uh… I don’t know if that would be the best… maybe we should just…”

                He’s not left to flounder about for long, because then the others begin to file inside in preparation for the meeting. Jerry sits down in between Ben and Leslie, entirely unaware of the strange tension between them, and Ben starts in on a conversation with Jerry, inquiring after his wife and kids.

                When Ann comes in, she gives Leslie a curious look, mouthing, _Well_?

                And Leslie just frowns, her brow furrowed and maybe she’s pouting a bit because she just doesn’t understand. After the show tonight, she’ll ask him to explain himself properly.

                They all go silent the moment Chris jogs through the door, fresh from his afternoon twenty-mile run along the lake. He’s beaming from ear to ear—mind you, Chris is perpetually beaming from ear to ear.

                “Good evening everyone! I’d like to start off by saying what a wonderful job you all did last night. I’m not afraid to say that it was _literally_ the best I’ve ever seen you. Now before we talk about tonight’s show, Ben has something to say.”

                Everyone looks toward Ben apprehensively. When Chris has any bad news, Ben is always the vehicle through which he delivers it.

                “Hey guys, you might notice that Joe isn’t here tonight. That’s because Chris has had to let him go, and while I don’t think I need to go into specifics…” He doesn’t. Everyone knew about Donna and Joe. “I’ll just say that Chris has a pretty strict policy about inter-troupe dating. It puts our sketches in jeopardy and that puts the whole troupe in jeopardy.”

                As he says this, he glances toward Leslie for a few moments before pointedly looking around the room at everybody else.

                Her stomach drops away and she doesn’t catch another word of Chris’s announcements because she’s too busy listening to the buzzing in her ears.

                When Chris dismisses them to prepare, she doesn’t budge, and it seems as though Ben is thinking the same thing because he stays behind too.

                They don’t look at each other, and it takes a few moments before either of them can speak. Finally, Ben says, “So, uh, as I was saying, after the show… we can stay behind. In the building. And brainstorm.”

                Maybe she should agree, because she shouldn’t push it. But instead she points out, “Well, Ron’s pub is in the building. We can chat down there over drinks.”

                He hesitates, but then he looks over at her and she looks over at him and he cracks a lopsided smile. “I suppose that’s true. Okay. It’s a not-date.”

                A not-date. Leslie can live with that, for the moment at least.


End file.
